I Hear Your Voice Review

I Hear Your Voice has been one of the big daddy in ratings, hitting 20% and above, which is apparently a feat. It has garnered attention and love from Korea and I can see why. LEE JONG SEOK is just too cute 😀 (drooling) That however wouldn’t have suffice if Lee Bo Young and Yoon Sang Kyung didn’t perform well. Well, who am I kidding, they are both senior in terms of acting. This also marks Lee Bo Young’s second big break after My Daughter Seo Young.

Synopsis from dramawiki:

A thriller courtroom drama with fantasy and romantic comedy elements. It will depict the story of Jang Hye Sung (Lee Bo Young), a bold, sassy, thick-faced, comical, and materialistic public defender who becomes a lawyer after overcoming poverty and painful memories from her childhood, comes to realizations about society and justice after meeting Park Soo Ha (Lee Jong Suk), a 19-year-old boy who reads other people’s thoughts and Cha Kwan Woo (Yoon Sang Hyun), an innocent lawyer who lives a disciplined life. Jang Hye Sung is actually Soo Ha’s first love after she gave a decisive testimony on his father’s murder case 10 years ago and Soo Ha promised to protect her from the killer’s threats. Meanwhile, Cha Kwan Woo is Jang Hye Sung’s fellow lawyer who is a cheerful and idealistic former cop even though his character a bit slow, he is nice and pleasant with a firm idea of his principles and justice. Together they will team up to to find the justice in the courtroom and solve the toughest cases with less than 1% chance of winning.

The title I Hear Your Voice, literally depicts how Soo Ha can hear people’s thoughts. However, it also depicts how Hye Seong and Lawyer Cha need to hear the voices of their defendants. Like Soo Ha who hears two kinds of voice in his head, it’s up to the public defenders to judge which voice they are hearing. Are their voices telling the truth or building up lies? Lawyer Cha and Hye Seong are on the opposite ends of the spectrum when it comes to their commitment in their work. Being a public defender was Lawyer Cha’s dream but Hye Seong is in it for money. Lawyer Cha whole-heartedly trusts his defendants, whereas Hye Seong don’t really care whether the defendants are guilty or innocent, However, ultimately they both learn their lessons as the drama progresses. Hye Seong is put in the shoes of a victim and realizes how much the truth matters to her and probably to all the others too.

In this drama, they build up a good story with LOTS of moral input. Given, it’s a courtroom drama so things like black and white or is it plain grey comes up. When people are unfairly treated and the law fails to protect their rights, is it wrong to take matter into their own hands? It’s a dilemma they present in each case. Even so, the law is cold-hearted and blind to those who retaliate. Our public defenders, judges and prosecutors enter the picture, and brings back some soul into verdicts. I’ve seen comments to NOT take the drama seriously because obviously it is disparate from reality. But we do get the message, don’t kill even if you are going to be killed. Once you murder, you kill all the reasoning too.

It’s also all on Hye Seong when she continue to regret making the choice she had 10 years ago. She regrets standing up as a witness and the loss of her mother makes it all more valid for her. I thought her incident with Do Yeon would have made her a justice fighter but no, she doesn’t really change. In Soo Ha’s court case, it was just that split second decision that changes her life however, it evidently wasn’t quite enough to change her personality or beliefs. I like that because she was just a normal girl who did a righteous thing that one time but it doesn’t mean she isn’t wrong in whatever she does after. I love it even more that she realizes that both choices were the ones she would regret except she would regret one 1% more than the other. It’s same in life because let’s face it, whether it’s the road taken or the road not taken, we are going to regret them.

Soo Ha must be why all the noonas and ahjummas are tuning in because that’s what lured me in the first place. I loved how he was cute as a puppy, loaded with brains and sympathized his abandonment issues. Then I realized how cliche his character was. No fear however because the writer helps us love him more and tries to flaw him a little although not much. I mean, who wouldn’t be glad to have a younger, hotter boy declaring that he shall protect you at all odds? I would, hehe. He gains a lot of pity pies with how his uncle abandons him, how he could hear true thoughts which aren’t always nice and how he always tries his best to be on par with Hye Seong. Not to forget, he had to witness his father beaten to death. I mean, the kid is too normal after all these incidents. He should be having PTSD or something… o.o I thought having the ability to hear people’s unvoiced thoughts would be amazing but for Soo Ha, it’s uncalled for. It’s intrusive and voyeuristic, and for people to be invaded like that was a nightmare. Soo Ha would be a nightmare to a lot of people and honestly, I don’t know if I could cope with a mind reader all the time. I thought Lee Jong Seok was amazing at conveying angsty scenes though, where he looks like a distressed puppy trying so hard to grab on a float in the middle of the ocean. Hye Seong was that float, his lifeline and without her, Soo Ha would go berserk.

In real life, Lee Bo Young and Lee Jong Seok are 11 years apart, which is about the same in the drama. Yet, it amazes me with the way they comfortably fit each other. They have quite a good chemistry running there. Despite Soo Ha being a senior high school student, it didn’t make their relationship seem impossible. For a while, I thought it was because they rely on each other so much. Soo Ha needed the TLC in his life and Hye Seong could use some insights into understanding her cases. Then later on, it just developed into pure LOVEEE ❤ Omigod, this is cheesy. It’s quite cute to see them quite chaste and pure as well 😀

Jung Woong In stars as the villain of the drama, Min Joon Gook. Right from the start, we see how cruel and twisted he is and by the time our leads have grown up, he has served many years in the prison. I’m assuming he must have spent a lot of time upping his IQ because he is one smart villain. Like a fox disguising as a sheep, he goes after Hye Seong to fulfill his promise of killing her, since she stood up as witness. It was really laterrr when they revealed the motivations behind his actions. I don’t know if that could redeem his character because he went too far off the edge. It’s really regrettable that such things happened to his family but as Hye Seong’s mother says, an eye for an eye and the whole world would be blind. I thought he was really good since he really convinced me that he is a villain not to be toyed with. Good job there, Jung Woong In.

I actually loved Do Yeon’s character. She and Hye Seong really have no difference personality wise. Except, she makes one mistake and screws up how everyone looks at her. She works her ass off to be a prosecutor, to prove her father and other people wrong. But the past is always going to haunt her, the fact that she picked the ‘wrong’ choice. I think it’s really human of her to do so though. I didn’t like that she had a birth secret though because it was unnecessary, overused, cliche and asking for sympathy. However, I like the tone that Hye Seong and Do Yeon have. They are like classic frenemies with some high school grudge they can’t get over.

Overall, I think it’s a great watch and worthwhile. Watch it when you can 🙂

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3 thoughts on “I Hear Your Voice Review”

I am interested to see how I feel about this drama in a year. I think I will love what I love about it, but what I do not love about it will become more weighty. I think this show just did something a little different and created two great lead characters with two actors that just clicked. I loved all of the characters, apart from Nerd Lawyer and Mean Girl Lawyer. I found Cha Kwan Woo a bit schizo in development, innocent dork to slight dork to jaded hot cop to dork to oh look I have some fighting skills…maybe…yeah. And I was never onboard with Do Yeon being redeemed. I also think the actress portraying Do Yeon was overrated. I saw a lot of praise on blogs for the actress and range of emotion, and all I could think was…how can you tell? Her face is so plastic there is no movement. The other problems were of course the lack of closure with the supernatural element and the weakness and total wtf of some of the legal stuff, and the awkward inserts of Su-ha’s classmates as filler or exposition. All that said despite how brutal it was at times, it at heart had a positive message and had a feel good ending.

I loved this one…
I have always loved court room dramas and legal thrillers- books, movies, soaps and sitcoms. I like those well written scripts that take advantage of the loopholes in law to build powerful twists in the plots, keeping the audience or viewers engaged till the end.

….a romantic comedy- my most favorite of Korean drama genres, with the right amount of courtroom cases, and a bit of fantasy. It’s just fun to watch them – when she tries to hide her humiliations and embarrassed thoughts from him, but he reads them anyhow.
I like the plot twists a lot.

I have Jiu Lu Fei Xiang's and Lin Jiacheng's express consents to translate Sansheng, Wangchuan Wu Shang and Mei Gongqing for non-commercial purposes. It is illegal to take my translations outside hamster428 without prior consent or to receive any monetary gains from them.